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Wordpress.com or Wordpress.org

I find the information confusing, and I want to host my own blog. Which is the better solution, and how to I prevent competitors from flagging my blog and having it get removed? My blog is not spam by any means.

On this site you can download and install a software script called WordPress. To do this you need a web host who meets the minimum requirements and a little time. WordPress is completely customizable and can be used for almost anything. There is also a service called WordPress.com which lets you get started with a new and free WordPress-based blog in seconds, but varies in several ways and is less flexible than the WordPress you download and install yourself.

You can host your blog on Wordpress.com for free or other paid hosting plans.

Blogs only get removed if you posting something against WordPress.com's TOS.

WordPress.org is the software, so if you want to host it yourself than that is where you go to get a copy of it. WordPress.com is a hosted service for WordPress, so if you don't want to host it yourself then you can have a blog setup for you on the WordPress.com servers.

You have a lot more control by using your own install from WordPress.org, but it is a lot more complicated and it will cost you money for hosting unless you get a free host (not recommended usually). There are advantages to both, but it depends on what you are aiming to achieve, how much time you have to put into it and how much technical stuff you want to learn.

The best idea is to host it by yourself that is because if you are using a host from wordpress, you can not change the source code (for security reasons and acessing their database through mysqli_connect). If you really want to have a good blog, you should host it yourself. Start with a free host if you dont have a host yet. Then you can edit the sidebars and widgets. If you dont want to get a host, blogspot is very versatile and monetarized.

If you just want a blog, go to wordpress.com - if you want to run a blog, make custom changes, capture revenue from your content an effort, or just have a full backup of your efforts go to wordpress.org and get the software and install it somewhere.

Which then opens up a whole can of worms from who do you host with to how much do you pay for it. ANd of course do you set wordpress up yourself or pay someone else to do it.

IMHO - if you are a business, go with your own blog on a hosted account and be sure to set up the account seperate from any family or other businesses...keeps account security and billing easy and at very low prices under $5 per month for a good amount of bandwidth and storage its a small cost

That is a thread all in of itself. It depends on what youw ant to do with the site, your storage and bandwidth needs, hosted, virtual or actual dedicated servers, budget, commissions, sublet space to others via cPanel or others

Me - I go to either end - a full dedicated server in a rack, or down to GoDaddy and nothing in between

Oh yeah -ads - get it for free expect to have their ads on your site.

I have given hosting for free to gaming communities as long as they used our gaming services and participated. But the hardest part of that was idiots who came in looking for free who did not read the requirements. There are good free options out there, you just have to search for them wih a cautious eye - and dont lose the rights to your content

IMHO most important - easy ability to FTP my files for upload and backup

Not true. Freehostia.com offers free hosting without any ads whatsoever. They've been around for a few years now too and aren't looking like dropping their free service any time.

I use their hosting for a test site of mine. It runs quite slowly, but there are no ads and it seems to have reasonable'ish uptime (albeit it goes down about 10x more often than my Hostgator account) ... http://ryanhellyer.freehostia.com/wordpress4/

Having said that, the paid services are (unsurprisingly) almost always better.

If you go the route to host your own wordpress software on your own domain, I'd personally look for a host that installs it for you. For example, my host has a "1 click" install of Wordpress (& many other apps). I just have to fill in a few fields, and boom it's installed. It's also set up to "upgrade" newer versions at a click of my mouse.

Ya still have to mess and set up all the personal preferences instide wordpress's dashboard, but for me, One Click Installs is the way to go.

I always thought WordPress was easy enough to install - just download the single file, upload and answer the questions. But you are right, depending on the host you need to go through a few different screens to set up the director, rights, and the database.

But is that a good indicator of your tech comfort level, whether you set it up yourself or not? Because the other side of self hosting is self-support when something goes wrong. If you are not familiar with your providers tools to do a manual setup, are you going to be able to troubleshoot any issues later?